PARALYMPICS Ireland's Jason Smyth Wins 100m Paralympic Gold in World Record Time

Irish sprinter Jason Smyth set the Bird's Nest track on fire tonight in Beijing winning 100m (T13 Vision Impaired category) GOLD in a new Paralympic World record time of 10.62sec. It was two world records in one day for the twenty year old as tonight he broke the 10.81sec mark he set in qualifying this morning by almost two tenths of a second. The Derry athlete is not finished yet as he also runs in the T13 200m in which he is the reigning world champion and record holder. The heats of the 200m are Monday with the final on Tuesday.


Afterwards a delighted Smyth said: "I'm thrilled; it's awesome! I've put in so much work; it's all gone so well. To break my own world record twice in one day I knew it was there; it was just a matter of coming out and doing it on the big occassion, and I'm so pleased I did."


Smyth sensational win is the second gold for Ireland at these Games after his room mate Michael McKillop won 800m (T37) gold on Wednesday night also in world record time. It is the third Irish medal at these Games after Gay Shelly got the team off the mark on Tuesday with bronze in the individual Boccia competition.



For Further Information contact the press officers to the Irish team:
Sinéad McElroy, smcelroy@irishsportscouncil.ie 087-6338512 or 008613911678098
John Fulham, communications@pcireland.ie 087-2709182 or 008613911678366